Polymeric films, elastic continuous filament arrays, nonwoven webs and laminates thereof may be manufactured into personal care products and components of products so inexpensively that the products could be viewed as disposable after only one or a few uses. Representatives of such products include articles such as diapers, adult incontinence devices, swimwear, feminine care products, and child training pants. Other such personal care disposable products include tissues, wipes, mattress pads, veterinary products, mortuary products, article covers and medical-related protective products such as everyday use garments and garments worn in a medical setting, face masks, sterilization wraps and hospital packaging materials.
It is generally known that the tactile properties of elastic materials can be improved by forming a laminate of the elastic material with one or more nonelastic materials on the outer surface(s) of the elastic material. For instance, in one such laminate material, a nonelastic material is joined to an elastic material while the elastic material is in a stretched condition so that when the elastic material is relaxed, the nonelastic material gathers between the locations where it is bonded to the elastic material. The resulting elastic laminate material is stretchable to the extent that the nonelastic material gathered between the bond locations allows the elastic material to elongate. In such a stretch bonded laminate process, either a just-formed (in-line produced material) or pre-formed (formed from a separately located manufacturing process) elastic material is stretched and then attached to the gatherable material. The elastic material is then allowed to retract, gathering the gatherable material and forming the stretch bonded laminate. An example of this type of stretch bonded laminate material is disclosed, for example, by U.S. Pat. No. 4,720,415 to Vander Wielen et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,385,775 to Wright and Publication No. WO 01/88245, each of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. Such laminates may include an elastic layer of one or more film layers, one or more foam layers, one or more web layers (woven or nonwoven) or a combination of such, and at least one facing layer. While stretch bonded laminate materials are effective in providing high levels of stretch and recovery in the machine direction, it would be desirable to provide such formed material with stretch and recovery properties also in the cross-machine direction, i.e. direction perpendicular to the normal stretch and recovery direction of the elastic laminate. Further, it would be desirable to further enhance the stretch and recovery properties in the machine direction. Additionally, it would be desirable to enhance such properties in a single processing step.
It is also known to laminate (or bond) a necked material to an elastic sheet to produce a neck bonded laminate which is capable of stretch and recovery in the cross-machine direction. This process involves an elastic member being bonded to a non-elastic member while only the non-elastic member is extended in one direction (usually the machine direction) and necked in the transverse direction, so as to reduce its dimension in the direction orthogonal to the extension. Such is described in detail in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,965,122, 4,981,747, 5,226,992, and 5,336,545 to Morman, each of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. It would be desirable to provide a neck bonded laminate that has both cross-machine and machine direction stretch and recovery attributes, and that also has enhanced material properties. It would also be desirable to provide such enhanced material properties in one processing step.
It is further known to utilize intermeshing grooved rolls or discs on axle apparatus for stretching nonwoven webs. For instance, it is known to use grooved rolls generally to stretch a formed elastic and non-elastic (extendable) neck bonded laminate. See for example U.S. Publication 20040121687. For example, it is known to provide a laminate of an elastomer material and an extendable material (such as a nonwoven) and process the laminate through a grooved roll process to make either a cross-machine direction elastic material (using a grooved roll apparatus with machine direction oriented grooves), or a machine direction elastic material (using a grooved roll apparatus with cross-machine direction oriented grooves) or still alternatively, a machine direction and cross-machine direction elastic material (using a series of grooved roll apparatus with a first apparatus having machine direction oriented grooves followed by a grooved roll apparatus with cross-machine direction grooves or vice versa). However, it has proven difficult to make the machine direction/cross-machine direction elastic laminate because the extendable or gatherable material (nonwoven) has to be so highly extended, first in one direction and then in the perpendicular direction. There is therefore a need for elastic low cost laminates for use in personal care products (and methods for making such laminates) that demonstrate enhanced elastic performance (such as either reduced percent set upon a first stretch in use by a consumer, or increased elastic performance, or the combination) and that can also benefit from being produced via a single step processing arrangement. It is also a need to provide such material that is particularly soft to the touch and drapable. Such softness would be desirable from both an aesthetic and comfort viewpoint. It is to such needs that the current invention is directed.